War Party
So I was digging through my music the other day looking for some different stuff to put on my Mp3 player when I came across one of my old Eddie Grant albums. Now, most of you will be too young to remember Eddie, and those that do will probably remember him for the atrocious "Electric Avenue" pop/reggae hit of the 80's. Believe me, that song is not representative of hisrepertoire! He is an awesome reggae artist and one of my favorite songs of his is titled "War Party".
This song is a great reggae tribute to the idea of peace. The gist of the song is "everyone's inviting me to a war party, me no wanna go, I heard about the last one so thanks but no thank you..."
Well, I put the song on my Mp3 player and promptly forgot about it... until it came on while I was walking home from work today. It struck me, immediately, how prescient this song is now. We are currently in the middle to two wars (Iraq and Afghanistan) and there are rumors of ever more (Iran, Russia, North Korea, etc.). The apropos-ness of the song got me to thinking about war, justification for war, freedom and all the other things that get thrown into the mix when those patriotic zealots start beating the war drums.
First off, I find it rather ironic that the Christians are usually the first ones jumping at the chance to attack someone. But then, I guess if you are willing to believe that some dude in a toga living in the clouds is listening to your prayers and watching everything you do, it is no hard stretch to get you to believe that brown people want to kill you. I mean, there isn't a real high bar there for logic or common sense.
More annoying than the turn-the-other-cheekers deciding that preemptive military action is somehow okay, however, is their absolutely imbecilic idea that fighting-them-there-well-prevent-us-from-having-to-fight-them-here. The idea of pre-preemptive military attacks on a countries we have "decided" are "rogue" and then trying to force a new form of government on said country is so extremely hypocritical here in America that anyone trying to justify such a use of force should be punched in the head for having slept through elementary school history. What the hell do these people think the Revolutionary War was about?!? What do these folks think the British thought of us back then? Do you suppose that they considered us to be a "rogue" country that needed to be brought to heel? How well did that go over?
This analogy is more spot-on than you might think. At the time of the Revolutionary War, Britain was the world's supreme superpower. Their military might was all-powerful. Their empire spanned the globe. America was a rag-tag group of colonies that had no military per se and very little political cohesion. Sound familiar?
Just like we thought Iraq would be a walk in the park, I am sure the Brits were hardly worried about stomping the Americans into oblivion. But then something happened the Brits could not have foreseen. Their attacks galvanized the American colonies into a unified, patriotic whole that fought with anything and everything they could. The resulting guerrilla war was something for which Britain (and the world at large) was completely unprepared.
They were not fighting an enemy that would face them on the field of battle. They were instead fighting ghosts, hiding in the shadows, picking off a few soldiers before running away.
The Brits weren't fighting a government that they could cow to their demands by political and economic sanctions, they were fighting a unified, fiercely-independent populace who was used to surviving on their own.
And, because the Brits (as the world's preeminent superpower) had made a few enemies along the way, they found they weren't just fighting Americans. The French, who had a real vested interest in the failure of Britain in that war, provide logistical, economic and military support to the colonists.
What Britain found was that even though they were militarily superior, they couldn't win. But it wasn't just because of the nature of the war, or the location of the war, or even the support of France. The real reason Britain lost was that the American spirit didn't allow for the possibility of a British win. It was all or nothing. The Brits would have had to exterminate nearly the entire American population if they ever hoped to end the guerrilla fighting. It was too much.
But even with such a glaring example in our own past (HELL! We INVENTED the idea of the rag-tag guerrilla band defeating the military superpower!) modern America has somehow completely unlearned the lessons of the Revolutionary War. And not just with respect to wars fought on foreign soil, but also about the silly rationale we use to justify those wars. You see, just like the British in the Revolutionary War, the Americans have no hope of "winning" in Iraq. The Iraqis are willing to fight to the last man to see us leave, and killing all the Iraqis is not "winning" by any but an idiot's definition.
Just like the American Revolutionaries, the Iraqis are receiving aid and support from countries that have vested interests in America's failure in Iraq. These countries have myriad reasons for detesting Americans and their empire-building ways. The problem is that most Americans don't know we are perceived as conquerors (or at least meddlers) because the snake-oil salesmen that we call politicians have sold these uneducated Luddites the line that we are somehow the "good guys" (in Iraq and elsewhere) because we are "spreading democracy".
I've got a news flash for you. Democracy only works for the people who choose it of their own free will. You can't force it on someone and still have it qualify as a Democracy. Truth be told, Democracy is merely one of many, many different forms of government. Many of our allies (whom we DO NOT attack) don't practice it.
For those really hard to reach Bible Belt imbeciles out there, let me put this another way. Imagine that America was overrun by Muslims and, after much bombing and strafing, the conquering Muslim army showed up at your door and said, "There! You are now free to be Muslim. We know that Islam is the best form of government and you are now free from your oppressive Democratic government and you can now freely practice the teachings of Islam." What would you do? If you say anything other than, "Oh, I would convert to Islam on the spot!" you have no right justifying the war in Iraq. This is exactly what we are doing there.
This idea of a conquering Muslim army also illustrates why the fight-them-over-there-so-we-don't-have-to fight-them-here mentality is so stupid. I ask you, would anyone in their right mind start a ground war in America? Think about it. We are the most armed populace on the planet. Our culture is based upon the ideas of personal freedom and fighting oppression. Anyone who considered attacking America would be looking at an impossible-to-win battle like no other. It could not be done. No American would give up. The costs of such a war would be globally devastating.
Now a war in Iraq (or Iran, or Syria, or Place-name-of-brown-skinned-country-here) does not have global costs: it just has American costs. The war in Iraq is not destroying France's economy. It is not destroying Germany's economy. It is destroying OUR economy. Those who would claim that war with Iraq is somehow protecting us are, in fact, justifying the very destruction of America (as we are witnessing every day in our current economic meltdown). And let's not even talk about the destruction of personal and human rights that has occurred right here in the name of the "War on Terror". Don't have to worry about Ahmed and Abdul "stealing our freedom," we are doing that just fine on our own, thank you very much!
It has to stop.
Stupid people need to learn. Dumb ideas need to be exposed for what they are. Ignorant racists need to be called out and xenophobic, religious bigots need to be put in there place (preferably one with bars). The time for politeness has come to an end. Those who would antagonize and attack need to be brought down and brought down hard.
America is better than this. It is time for the "War Party" to end.
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